My Happy 100

To celebrate my graduation from Hazelden’s Intensive Outpatient Program TODAYYYYYYY, I compiled my list of 100 things that I value about my sober self, about my sobriety, or that I’ve learned in sobriety.

Take a deep breath, and dive in!

I am worth recovery.

I am kind.

I am generous.

I am courageous.

I am fierce.

I am confident.

I am powerful.

I am free-spirited.

I am a rebel.

I am smart.

I am growing in wisdom.

I am funny. Hilarious, actually.

I am a phenomenal woman.

I am a warrior.

I am sensitive.

I am empathetic.

I am so, so capable.

I am a determined problem-solver.

I am not interested anymore in solving everyone’s problems.

I am a thinker.

I am so proud that I showed up honestly, with openness, and was and am willing; I can be vulnerable in safe places.

I erect my own boundaries and I maintain them.

I can and do change my mind.

I believe “nice girls” should get mad when it’s appropriate.

I love being sober, clear-minded, and safe.

I enjoy activities I associate with recovery.

I have a strong voice, and I will use it in recovery.

I actively engage in a relationship with Jesus every day.

I do not want to live in darkness and pain again, and I get to choose not to live there.

I can and do love myself right now, right here where I am today.

I do not want or need to hide who I am.

I am wonderfully and uniquely made to be who I am.

I have talents and strengths that can also be my weaknesses and failures.

I am striving to be better at being myself every day.

I am not afraid to say what I don’t like.

I am not hateful in recovery; I was during active use.

I deserve and strive for happiness; it really is a thing!

I am stronger in the sisterhood with others on my journey.

I rejoice in meeting challenges gracefully, sober.

I live in peace the world cannot steal from me; it’s mine to hold and it’s mine to lose.

I only have to choose the next right thing, today.

I am stronger than I ever knew.

I choose the tools I use to cope with my life.

I once chose alcohol as a tool, but it’s not an effective tool. So. I chose different tools.

I can solve problems from my safe place, without sacrificing myself.

I accept I cannot be me without my past, and so I forgive myself my past choices.

I am doing my best now and I always tried to do my best.

I am not friends with Alcohol and recognize how dangerous and self-destructive that relationship was.

I don’t know stuff, and I’m perfectly fine not knowing.

I love watching people experience the euphoria of early recovery.

I hate – passionately – when the drug of choice wins, even temporarily.

I wonder how people – women – cannot see themselves how I see them.

I like feeling things and knowing what I feel.

I feel grateful, every day. My greatest blessings have come from raindrops.

I have always been able to survive; I am strong.

I want to thrive and know I won’t all the time.

I can live and prosper and thrive despite the challenges.

I made two people who are kind, generous, and humble.

I accept that I have created beauty.

I deserve to surround myself with beauty.

I will not intentionally throw a stone at anyone.

I believe people want – so desperately – to be good.

I am intentional.

I can live for what is today.

I see potential, and I encourage it, while I accept with my whole heart what is.

I do not live in the past.

I have learned from my past.

I have so much more to learn.

I have experienced real, big-T, trauma.

I have also experienced real, little-T, trauma.

I could not cure my trauma responses on my own, no matter how hard I thought about it, no matter how many times I tried to convince myself it wasn’t real, and no matter how often someone told me I was being ridiculous.

I am not ridiculous.

I can recognize my feelings are wholly mine, and I choose to accept them, name them, and then let them go; I get to choose how I respond to my feelings.

I love knowing who I am.

I am confident in who I am, and, because I am, I can freely and actively enjoy who others are without envy or jealousy.

I can remember my trauma without having to relive it.

I work in my own sphere of influence to change the world.

I long, sometimes, for things (life, recovery, love…) to be easier.

I am – otherwise – not a wisher.

I have joy in knowing the best is yet to come.

I know what sacrificial love is: it’s the only kind of love that endures.

I expect to experience great joy in the future, and I expect to recognize and celebrate it when I do, knowing it will pass.

I expect to experience grief, sadness, even anger, and I expect to accept it when I do, knowing it will pass.

I do not know all the details, and I do not care that I don’t know.

I was scared on June 7: my relapse scared me more than any other thing I have ever done.

I know my relapse started months before I bought alcohol

I feel lonely, often, in the midst of people.

I did not enter into recovery because of the threat of legal consequences.

I have worked hard to comply with the consequences for my behavior.

I live in gratitude for the Grace that saved me from hurting or killing myself while in active alcohol abuse.

I deserve to love.

I deserve to be loved.

I deserve to be cherised.

I deserve to be protected.

I deserve to be safe.

I am the daughter of a King, and I choose to live as one.

I treasure the presence of the Holy Spirit in my life.

I actively share my favorite verse from Romans: there is no condemnation (8:1). Repeat it with me: there is NO condemnation.

I cherish the friends who have held my truth until I was ready for it.

Last, and best: I know my life in Christ attracts people to Him.

Now. Go write yours. It’s easy!

God! Grant me the SERENITY to accept the things I cannot change, the COURAGE to change the things I can, and the WISDOM to know the difference. Peace!